You would think that the combined minds of Motorola, Google, Samsung, RIM and HP would be able to release a tablet that would put the iPad 2 to shame.
On the contrary it looks like Steve Jobs “magical” device has already claimed their first victim, as Motorola’s Xoom has predictably failed in the market, with only 100,000 units sold to consumers since the tablet made its debut.
Unlike Motorola (who was Google’s “beta test”), RIM could actually challenge Apple’s tablet with the Blackberry Playbook if it were not the fact that it is half the size of iPad 2 while matching Steve Jobs on price.
Although HP’s TouchPad could challenge Apple, the webOS tablet is rather lacking in the app department, which might make it difficult to convince consumers to defect from iOS in an “there’s an app for that” world.
While the iPad 2 is far from perfect, it’s outselling their entire competition combined, several times over (as anyone visiting an Apple, Best Buy or wireless carrier store will testify).
Hopefully a strong contender (perhaps Samsung?) on the horizon emerges soon, as having one man from one company controlling one device determine the fate of the tablet industry is rather scary (even for an iOS fan boy like myself).
Originally posted on April 6, 2011 @ 3:14 pm